6 buried alive under pit while prospecting for gold

Six people died last week Thursday in Subrisu Fante – a remote community in the Ahafo Ano North District of the Ashanti region – when a mine pit caved in on them as they prospected for gold.

Two of the six bodies of the illegal small-scale gold prospectors (galamseyers) have been retrieved from the 12-metre deep pit.

Several others were injured in the accident but were rescued and sent to the Tepa Government hospital for treatment.

XYZ News’ Ashanti regional correspondent, Isaac Bediako Justice, reports that the Police and Fire Officials from the Tepa Command, who have been rescuing survivors and retrieving bodies of the dead since the incident occurred have given up all hope of finding any more survivors or bodies.

The Police Command has ordered the Chief of the area to bury the remaining bodies if found. More than 50 people have died from similar mining disasters in the same village in the past 3 years. Seventeen people were buried alive under another pit in the same area a little over two years ago. The same problem is found in other parts of the country, including Western and Eastern regions.

Bediako Justice says the village folk believe such deathly disasters are a sacrifice to the gods who reciprocate with bountiful gold finds after certain rituals are gone through.

He says some concerned residents in the village want the government to urgently stop all illegal gold mining activities there, so as to save lives and huge tracts of cocoa farms which are being decimated by the activities of the illegal miners. A government taskforce which begun clamping down on both illegal foreign and local miners suspended its work a few months ago.